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THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY ~ PARABLE OF THE COCKLE AND THE GOOD SEED

(Read Matt. xiii, 24-30.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY what abundant seed of lights and good thoughts, impulses and holy inspirations God has till now sown in your mind. I the case of any other perhaps they would have more than sufficed to make him a saint. Consider then what fruit of good works this abundant and good seed has up to now produced in you. How much good that our Lord with His special inspirations expected of you have you failed to do? Of how many negligence have you been guilty? What sins have you not knowingly and deliberately committed?

APPLICATION: Examine carefully the kind of life you have led up till now. Place along side of it the gifts of grace which you have received so copiously from the hand of God. You will thus find abundant matter for confusion.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: He hath not dealt with us after our sins, not rewarded us according to our iniquities. (Ps. cii, 10.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY the origin of this want of correspondence by which you return Him a harvest of cockle of sin instead of the pure wheat of virtue. From whence then hath it cockle? The cause is twofold, namely – the fault of your own slothfulness, and the malice of your enemies. He who sleeps has his eyes closed and is alive only as to his body, but as to his soul he is unconscious. You too are as one sleeping because you keep your eyes closed to all the interests of your soul, and look only to satisfy your senses. This is the first cause of the growth of cockle. The second is the malice of your mortal enemies who, seeing you so negligent, never cease to sow within you the seeds of worldly thoughts and ideas, of suggestions and desires from which nothing but evil can result.

APPLICATION: Be vigilant therefore and watch over yourself, if you would close the entrance against these enemies who themselves never sleep.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Thou hast been my hope, a tower of strength against the face of the enemy. (Ps. lx, 4.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that the good seed cannot at first be easily distinguished from the bad, nor the wheat from the cockle, but at the harvest they are at once recognised. So in this life where the virtuous live together with sinners, the more perfect with the less so, it is not always easy to distinguish the one from the other. Nay, even in the same person a fault may often mistaken for a virtue; envy may appear to be zeal, sloth moderation, and so on. But how easily will be seen the difference at the harvest time, when the Divine Husbandman will order the good grain to be separated from the cockle, vice from virtue, the reprobate from the elect: Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn. Oh what a great separation will that be – the separation of the reprobate into eternal fire, and of the elect to the glory of Paradise.

APPLICATION: Remember that you also remain ever exposed to this separation even unto the last moment of your life. Ever bear this thought seriously and frequently in your heart.

AAFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS:The eyes of the Lord are upon the just, but the countenance of the Lord is against them that do evil things. (Ps. xxxiii, 16-17.)

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MONDAY AFTER THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY ~ PERSEVERANCE

He that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved.  (Matt. x, 22.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that the thought of a long life before you is often that which prevents you from persevering in the virtues you have begun to practise. Entertain rather the thought that each day may very likely be your last. When our Lord says, through the mouth of St. John: Behold I come quickly (Apoc. iii, 11), He does not say I shall come, but I come, for He comes with rapid strides and is even at the doors. (Matt. xxiv, 33.) This same warning is also repeated in your ears, perhaps by growing infirmities, perhaps by the failing of sight or of hearing and so forth.

APPLICATION: Notice how the Apostle speaking of the trumpet of the day of judgment calls it the last trumpet, because many others have already preceded it. When you hear of someone being killed by a fall, another by the sword, another by taking cold, another by some unexpected accident, all these things are so many trumpet-sounds of warning for you. How many such warning notes have you not already heard? Yet you never think that they sound as a warning to you.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: O remember not our former iniquities. Let thy mercies speedily prevent us. (Ps. lxxviii, 8.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that if the Lord delays to come, you must resolutely encourage yourself to persevere, for everything is at stake. What would happen to you if for want of patience for a few days, you came to lose that glorious crown which is prepared for you, if only you persevere, by always keeping alive in your heart that desire of serving God, practising those same exercises of devotion, that same regularity, that same obedience with which you began a really new life?

APPLICATION: The grace of God which you need for this is always at hand for you; you have but to ask for it with all your heart.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: With my whole heart I have sought after thee; let me not stray from thy commandments. (Ps. cxviii, 10.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that perseverance in order to obtain the crown is all to your own advantage, and not that of our Lord. If you compass your own loss, there will not be wanting to Him other servants, as many as He would. It is our Lord Himself Who holds the crown ready for you, and by no one can it be wrested from you by force.

APPLICATION: Reflect then seriously how He has chosen you, loved you and given you the means of winning this crown, in preference to so many others whom He has not favoured in like manner. But if He sees your great ingratitude, He will then abandon you, and find elsewhere another to inherit the crown offered first to you, and by you so unworthily rejected.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Thou hast prevented him with blessings of sweetness; thou hast set a crown of precious stones upon his head. (Ps. xx, 4.)

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TUESDAY AFTER THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY ~ MORTIFICATION

That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. (John iii, 6.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY with what serious punishment God threatens the man who wishes to live a life according to the flesh. If, says St. Paul, you live according to the flesh you shall die. (Rom. viii, 13.) Such a one yields to his nature in all things and grants it daily all that it demands. On the other hand, consider the high reward of him who is willing to mortify the flesh and all its ill-ordered desires. If by the spirit you mortify the deeds of the flesh you shall live. (Rom. viii, 13.)

APPLICATION: Make then your choice from henceforth whether you will take the way that leads to life, or that which leads to death. Consider also well that it is not as easy to turn back half-way, as it is not to start at all on the wrong path.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Our heart hath not turned back; neither hast thou turned aside our steps from thy way. (Ps. xliii, 19.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that the death threatened to him who lives according to the flesh has in it more deaths than one. The first is the death of sin, because this is the first that really happens. The second is the death of nature, which having its origins in original sin is hastened by actual sin. The third is the death of eternal loss. These alas, very often happen at one and the same time, for at the moment one may sin, one may die, and one may be cast into hell. Oh what a terrible ending! On the other hand think how the life that is promised to him who mortifies the flesh is likewise a three-fold life. The first is the natural life, for godliness and holiness prolong even one’s years: He that is temperate shall prolong life. (Ecclus xxxvii, 34.) The second is the life of grace, which is obtained and preserved by mortification. The third is the life of glory, which mortification increases in the next world, and even in this life anticipates by spiritual consolations.

APPLICATION: Observe well then that if mortification be in reality a true love of oneself, the satisfying of the desires of nature is real hatred of one’s own best interests.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: I have hated and abhorred iniquity; but thy law I have loved. (Ps. cxviii, 153.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that a life purely of the spirit is not possible on this earth, but only in heaven above. Still it is by the spirit that you must try to oppose and restrain the insolence of the flesh, which with its untamed impulses dares to rebel against him whom it ought to obey. Notice moreover that there are three kinds of life. First, the life of the angels, which is entirely spiritual, and to which we may not hope to attain; the second is the mere animal life, and this we must simply abhor; the third, the life of a mortified man, which lies midway between the other two.

APPLICATION: This latter then is the life which you should embrace. When this mortification is of an ordinary degree, it is that of a reasonable and of a Christian man; when it is one of a more eminent degree, it is that of a truly spiritual man such as the Apostle speaks of: Always bearing about in our body the mortifications of Jesus. (2 Cor. iv, 10.) To this life we can all at least aspire.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Who will give me the wings of a dove, and I will fly and be at rest? (Ps. liv, 7.)

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WEDNESDAY AFTER THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY ~ PURITY OF INTENTION

Not every one that saith to me Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven. (Matt. vii, 21.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that all that you do, not only in your religious actions but even in your ordinary ones, should be all directed to the honour of God, and this not merely by a general intention but also if possible by an actual one. Thus will you increase your merit, for how many of your works gain for you no fruit because you do them only from natural motives? Elevate them to God, so that your work and your studies, your eating and sleeping, the innocent recreations you enjoy, all you do may be directed to the honour and glory of God.

APPLICATION: If you act only to please yourself, you acquire the habit of always fostering self-love, to your own great detriment and loss. If, on the contrary, you offer the fruit of all your works to our Lord you will be very pleasing to Him, and will be able to say to God: All fruits, the new and the old, I have kept for thee (Cant. vii, 13), the new being the works of grace, and the old the works of nature.

AAFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: I will offer thee burnt offerings full of marrow. (Ps. lxv, 15.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that although it suffices to offer all your works to God at the beginning of each day, it is still better to renew your offering from time to time during the day. It is unfortunately only too easy for this first intention and offering to become diverted or even annulled by one’s own self-love.

APPLICATION: Be careful therefore to renew your intentions as often as you can. This habit will become quite easy to you in time, and by its means you will be doing everything in general and each thing in particular in honour of God, in the name of the Lord as St. Paul says (Col. iii, 17), not merely for the name of God, as one who offers by habit, but in the name of God, as one who in very deed offers each act.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Give glory to the Lord, and call upon His name. (Ps. civ, 1.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that just in the same way as you offer all things to God, even so must you thank Him for all, seeing that all you offer is His gift. You are as it were a river swollen with the tide of God’s goodness. Bear back to Him therefore all He has given you. This thanksgiving you should offer direct to God the Father, Who is the origin of all the good that comes to us. But also since He has given us all things through Christ, so it is His pleasure that we should thank Him for all things through Christ.

APPLICATION: Be careful to cultivate these sentiments of gratitude. Think often of the lesson regarding it taught by Jesus Christ in the parable of the lepers. How pitiable, on the contrary, is the state of those who instead of so doing, rather live like the beasts of earth that graze on the pasture that lies before them, without once raising their eyes to the giver of their food.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Sing unto the Lord a new song, let His praise be in the church of the saints. (Ps. cxlix, 1.)

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THURSDAY AFTER THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY ~ ZEAL FOR SOULS

I was not sent but to the sheep that are lost. (Matt. xv, 24.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that you who by the grace of God have already entered upon the right way, are in duty bound to draw others from their evil ways. You too should do your utmost to save the souls of your neighbours from the death of sin. Think of the state of a body when the soul has left it, and realise how far worse is the state of a soul when she has lost her God. The body is not conscious of its loss, but the soul that has lost God, thought she may not realise it at once will, alas, do so later on.

APPLICATION: If then you may be the means of saving the soul of your neighbour from such a death, you too will become in very deed a saviour like unto Jesus Christ Himself. Does not this appear to you to be an object worthy of your highest ambition?

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: He hath delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears and my feet from falling. (Ps. cxiv, 8.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that our Lord has willed that the charity which recalls those who have erred, should not go unrewarded, for it shall cover a multitude of sins. Is not that itself an immense reward? In return for the good you do to your neighbour by drawing him back from the death of the soul, God will remit the punishment due to your past sins, and will even forgive the guilt of your present ones. If they are venial He will pardon them instantly because of that act of charity; if they are mortal, He will give you the help of His grace to enter into yourself and to detest them. He will moreover give you efficacious grace to preserve you from temptations and to strengthen you in trials, and He will visit you still more lovingly in time of prayer.

APPLICATION: Reflect then that this reward shall also be yours, if you endeavour to call back sinners from the error of their ways.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Mine eyes have sent forth springs of water, because they have not kept thy law. (Ps. cxviii, 136.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that perhaps you excuse yourself from exercising this great charity because you are neither a preacher nor a missionary. But though you neither preach nor teach, why cannot you at least help your neighbours by a word of warning, of correction or of counsel and by giving good example? Why cannot you come to their assistance by your constant prayers to win their conversion from God? He who attempts the conversion of sinners by dealing directly with them often fails and works in vain, but he who treats the matter with God in the way he ought, always obtains it.

APPLICATION: What excuse then have you if you do not ask God to open the eyes of a sinner that they may enter into themselves and may repent? Pray one for another, that you may be saved. For the continual prayer of a just man availeth much. (James v, 16.)

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Fainting hath laid hold upon me, because of the wicked that forsake thy law. (Ps. cxviii, 53.)

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FRIDAY AFTER THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY ~ LIFE OF GRACE

Without me you can do nothing. (John xv, 5.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that by the word justice in Holy Scripture is often understood the grace of God which makes a man just. Without it man is the most miserable of beings, hardly deserving the name of a man. Now you must be ready to preserve within you this grace of God at any cost that may be necessary. There must be no detachment from self or from those dear to you that you will not be ready to bear. Nay, even, you must be ready to part with life rather than be led to lose that grace which is the life of the soul and life eternal. The grace of God is life everlasting. (Rom. vi, 23.)

APPLICATION: This death which might have to be encountered in order to preserve grace is twofold, the one real, the other figurative or spiritual. Those die a real death who let themselves even be killed rather than yield to what is wrong. For this death one must always be prepared. Those die spiritually who by continual self-denial can say with the Apostle: I die daily. (1 Cor. xv, 31.) It is to this death that you must submit yourself in order to preserve within you divine grace.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Thou art my hope, my portion in the land of the living. (Ps. cxli, 6.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that our inferior nature has a great repugnance not only to actual death but also to spiritual death. Strive for justice for thy soul, says Holy Scripture, and even unto death fight for justice, (Ecclus. iv, 33.) How many there are in war who face the fire, either to please their sovereign, or for ambition’s sake, or for reward! You too with your higher nature must contend still more strenuously against your lower nature, and do for God what so many are not afraid of doing for the world. Strive for justice, and that not only in order to maintain yourself in a state of grace, but also to increase in grace, since every additional degree of grace well merits any amount of suffering for it, even were it the worst of deaths.

APPLICATION: Were you then even to hasten your death by the intensity of your fervour, how much better would it be in such a case to lose ten years of life, if by so doing you were to gain even ten degrees of grace! Were you to shorten your life whilst engaged in saving souls, happy indeed would be your lot, for you would thereby obtain a far more precious crown than all the world could give you.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: One day in thy courts is better than a thousand. (Ps. lxxxiii, 11.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that you may perhaps be inclined to shrink from such a high enterprise through the knowledge of your own weakness. Observe then what the Scripture adds: And God will overthrow thy enemies for thee. (Ecclus. iv, 33.) Your duty is to fight. It is for God to conquer for you. Of yourself you can do nothing but if you neglect not the little that you can do, with the help of the grace that God is ever giving you to overcome your unruly inclinations, your love of ease and of praise, God will give you the strength to fight well, and He will at the same time give you the victory.

APPLICATION: See then that you do not grow weary of co-operating with divine grace, and come to lay down your arms, for it is only by your doing so that your enemies can ever triumph over you. Be constant therefore and faithful, fight manfully, even unto the hour of your death, and God will overthrow thy enemies for thee.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: If armies in camp should stand together against me, my heart shall not fear. (Ps. xxvi, 3.)

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SATURDAY AFTER THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY ~ THE WILL OF GOD

My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me. (John iv, 34.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that Christ says that His food is to do the will of His Father. He does not speak of His labours, His journeys, His preaching and suffering for the salvation of men, as His food, although in reality the Father’s will consisted in all these things. This is to teach you that what most sustains and nourishes the spiritual life does not consist so much in the performance of the duties imposed on you by your state in life or by obedience, as in having always the intention of doing in them your Heavenly Father’s will.

APPLICATION: In whatsoever place therefore or condition you may be, whatever duty or work you have in hand, whether more arduous or less, you must be solicitous only to do the will of God, for this is your real food.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: How sweet are thy words unto my taste, yea sweeter than honey unto my mouth. (Ps. cxviii, 103.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that the accomplishment of the holy will of God is the food of the soul, because just as food sustains the life of the body, so does the fulfillment of the will of God in your actions sustain in you the life of the soul in grace. There is however this great difference and advantage, that whereas ordinary food cannot in the long run keep death from the body, by doing always the will of God your soul will never perish: Labour for the meat that endureth unto life everlasting. (John vi, 27.)

APPLICATION: If in all your daily duties you aim at anything else than the fulfillment of the Divine Will, it will not become for you food unto life everlasting, but food that is tainted and corrupted by ill-regulated and worldly aims. If on the contrary you are in all your actions intent on doing the will of God, it will be to you the food of life, even of eternal life: your soul shall live. (Isa. lv, 3.)

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Thy law is in the midst of my heart. (Ps. xxxix, 9.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that material food not only maintains and preserves the life of the body, but strengthens and gives it growth, imparting vigour, restoring it when it is weak, perfecting it and bringing it to its full stature. Spiritual food acts in the same way with the soul. It makes it progress by degrees and raises it from the state of beginners to that of proficients to that of perfect. Moreover it strengthens and restores it.

APPLICATION: What then can possibly give more content to a follower of Jesus Christ, than does the certainty that he has, that in whatever position he may be placed under the obedience of a superior, he may be sure that he is doing the will of God? He is certain that he can never have any more holy occupation than that of fulfilling the will of his Heavenly Father. It is this that in all things rejoices and reanimates his soul, and makes him able to say with Christ: I do always those things that please Him. Set yourself then only to do the will of your Heavenly Father in such a manner that every occupation, place, and work will become pleasant for you.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: One thing I have asked of the Lord, this will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. (Ps. xxvi, 4.)

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